Page 578 - A GRAMMAR OF BHOJPURI _ PhD Dissertation 2020 TU

to the verbal complex. Personal pronouns show three persons, two numbers, and three
degrees of honorificity distinction.

The gender of the bound pronouns is incorporated into verbal morphology as
agreement affixes, also incorporating number and honorificity of the bound pronouns.
The third person pronouns also show proximal and distal distinction. Bhojpuri

pronouns include demonstrative, interrogative and indefinite which play a vital role in
referential coherence. The topic coding devices found in Bhojpuri discourse are zero

anaphora, unstressed anaphoric pronouns, stressed independent pronouns, R-
dislocation, neutral word order and L-dislocation, zero anaphors vs. R-dislocated

definite full-NPs, R-dislocated DEF-NPs, Y-moved NPs, cleft/focus constructions
and referential indefinite NPs.

Bhojpuri exploits some discourse-pragmatic strategies to mark the definiteness
of the referents. Bhojpuri does not possess the English like set of definite and
indefinite articles. However, indefinite pronominal adjective कौनो /kɔno/ ‘any/some’

and the numeral with classifier एगो /ek-ɡo/ 'one-CLF' function as indefinite reference
marker in Bhojpuri. Definiteness, in contrast, is marked by the demonstrative

pronouns. Bhojpuri also employs contextual definiteness.
In the domain of action continuity tense/aspect markers and participial clauses

are used as morphosyntactic devices in Bhojpuri. The narrative and procedural
discourse show the sequentiality of events. The thematic continuity is coded by
sequential participial clauses in Bhojpuri.

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